The Old House on the Corner Read online

  ‘Good morning.’ They turned and saw Rachel coming towards them leading Tiffany by the hand. ‘It’s a good job the baby can’t crawl otherwise he’d be wandering off too. Here, let me have Jack and I’ll wake Sarah up.’ She lifted the boy out of Gareth’s arms. ‘Perhaps the square should club together and buy her an alarm clock before one of the children is abducted.’

  ‘That mightn’t be a bad idea.’ Gareth chuckled. ‘Jack was on his way home.’

  At this, Rachel rolled her eyes and took the children into Sarah’s house – the front door was wide open. Gareth and Victoria smiled at each other. ‘Would you like a coffee?’ Victoria asked. ‘I was just about to make one for meself.’

  ‘I’d love one, thanks,’ he said.

  ‘The house is in a mess, I’ve been clearing drawers all morning and haven’t even done half yet.’

  Gareth said he didn’t mind, he was used to houses being in a mess, not strictly true as Hamilton Lodge could have featured in an ideal homes magazine if it hadn’t been for the kitchen. He followed Victoria into her own quaintly old-fashioned kitchen where the table was piled with bundles of cutlery tied with string, dishes, cookery books, pans, heaps of tablecloths and embroidered serviettes.

  ‘This is all going to a charity shop, so if there’s anything you fancy, just take it,’ Victoria said generously as she put the kettle on.

  ‘I’d like the eggcups.’ There was one shaped like a train, the other a car. ‘I used to have some like that when I was little, but they were different colours.’ He picked up the eggcups and fondled them. ‘These bring back memories.’

  Victoria smiled, rather sadly. ‘For me too. They were mine when I was little.’

  ‘I’ll look after them for you. You can have them back when you come home from New York, that’s if you’re coming home. Otherwise, I’ll keep them. Who will you be working for out there?’ he asked, genuinely interested.

  ‘A firm of economists, Parker Inc. They predict trends all over the world, anything to do with finance: pensions, house prices, how much people in China will be paying for rice in two thousand and fifty, that sort of thing. It’s not what I’m used to, but I’m sure I’ll soon get the hang of it.’

  ‘Sounds fascinating.’

  ‘Doesn’t it!’ Her face glowed and all of a sudden she looked almost beautiful. ‘Who do you work for?’

  ‘A place called Ace Designs. It’s in Duke Street. There’s just me and these three other guys. Damien’s the boss. He’s only a year older than me. But I’m just marking time,’ Gareth explained, his own face glowing. ‘I’m designing this really comprehensive site of me own. I do it at home. If there’s anything you want to know about football, like who was Tranmere Rover’s inside right in nineteen twenty-three, you’ll find it on Footy info.co.uk – when it’s finished, that is,’ he added hastily. ‘The research is taking ages.’

  ‘Wow!’ Victoria looked impressed. ‘There’s some footy books upstairs that belonged to me granddad. They’re awfully old. You can have them if you like. I’ll look them out later.’

  ‘Thanks – you won’t tell anyone about my site, will you?’ He realized he’d told her something that no one else in the world knew. If Debbie knew he was designing something that might make them very rich one day, she’d see it as a reason to spend even more.

  Victoria put her finger to her lips. ‘I won’t tell a soul. Would you like that coffee put in the microwave, Gareth? You’ve let it go cold.’

  ‘You haven’t touched yours, either.’

  ‘I forgot all about it. We’ve been too busy talking, that’s why.’

  The Jordan boys had gone for a ride on their bikes. ‘Watch out for the traffic lights,’ Marie had warned them. ‘Don’t dare budge until they’re green.’

  ‘We already know that, Ma,’ Patrick said impatiently. ‘You’d think I was seven years old, not seventeen.’

  ‘I’m sorry, lad,’ Marie said apologetically. ‘It’s just me, being daft, but you know I worry meself sick about you whenever you’re out of me sight.’

  ‘I know, Ma.’ Patrick’s voice was gentle now. He understood his mother’s fears. Hadn’t his brother, Danny, seen one of the people they loved most in the world shot dead in front of his eyes?

  ‘Have you got your mobiles now?’

  ‘Yes, Ma,’ they said together.

  ‘Well then, don’t hesitate to give us a ring if you’re in trouble.’

  ‘No, Ma.’ They both grinned and Danny said, ‘We’re not going to the North Pole, Ma.’

  ‘Just stop making fun of me. Have a nice time now.’ She watched until they turned out of the square and disappeared. When she went indoors, Liam was reading the Sunday paper. She wondered how he could remain so calm. ‘I miss going to Mass,’ she said. ‘I feel on edge.’

  He gave her one of his gentle smiles. ‘Sit down, Marie, stop wringing your hands, try to relax. You’re full of nervous tension and it does you no good at all.’

  ‘In a minute.’ She couldn’t imagine feeling relaxed. Later, she’d go up to the privacy of her bedroom and say the rosary. She kept the beads in their own little purse under her pillow. ‘The boys have gone to look at the docks. Is that far?’

  ‘Not on a bike, though I didn’t think Liverpool had any docks left.’

  ‘It’s a new one called Albert’s Dock. There’s an art gallery there, the Tate. You know how mad our Danny is on painting.’

  ‘And how good he is at it too. He’ll make a fine artist one day.’

  ‘Yes.’ She sat down and began to bite her nails.

  ‘Marie.’ He looked at her from over the paper.

  ‘Sorry.’ She folded her hands on her lap. Very soon, she’d have no nails left. ‘Did you hear that baby next door? It screamed its little head off until gone two, then another child took over. It sounded like a boy. Their poor mother must be done in.’

  ‘Why don’t you go round, offer to take the baby for a walk or something? Give the mother a break.’

  She raised a smile. ‘Are you wanting to be rid of me, Father?’

  ‘Marie!’

  ‘Oh, Jaysus. I’m sorry – Liam. I’ll go next door, like you said.’ She fled from the house.

  ‘Hello,’ their neighbour said listlessly when she opened the door. She wore tight jeans and a skimpy white T-shirt. Her midriff was bare. Despite her heavy eyes, she still managed to look desperately attractive. The baby was crying again. It sounded very weary.

  ‘I’m from next door,’ Marie began, but before she could finish, the woman said in a tired voice, ‘If you’ve come to complain about the noise, I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do about it. Alastair just cries and cries and now Jack’s started. He wants to go home.’

  ‘Ah, no. I haven’t come to complain, not at all. I’ve come to offer a hand. I thought you might like a wee rest while I took the baby for a walk or something. Is he teething? Our Danny had terrible trouble with his teeth.’

  The woman looked relieved. ‘That’s awfully kind of you. Alastair’s teething for England. Oh, does that sound silly? I hardly know what I’m saying these days. Come in. My name’s Sarah. What’s yours?’

  ‘Marie. I’ve got two boys, Patrick and Danny, they’re seventeen and fourteen, although Patrick will be eighteen on Saturday. They’ve gone out on their bikes and I can’t stop worrying they’ll be run over.’

  The house was moderately tidy when she went in. A little boy lay fast asleep on a rug in front of the fireplace, and a girl was equally dead to the world on the settee. The whole house must be worn out.

  ‘I thought children got easier as they got older,’ Sarah remarked drily.

  ‘Don’t you believe it, girl. You worry about them at school, then you worry about drugs and them getting beaten up in a club or marrying some woman who’ll make them miserable. You’ll be worrying about your children until the day you die. I know I will.’

  ‘I love them to bits,’ Sarah said tearfully. ‘But I’m a hopeless mother. You see, I never h
ad to look after them on their own until now.’

  ‘You’ll soon get used to it, Sarah,’ Marie said sympathetically. ‘Sit down while I see to the wee baby.’ He sounded as if he was upstairs. ‘Once he’s calmed down, I’ll make us a cup of tea.’

  A red-faced Alastair lay in his cot in a tangle of blankets looking as weary as he sounded. He was kicking his legs and waving his arms in a half-hearted way. ‘You’ll be sending your poor mam to an early grave, so you will,’ Marie told him. He had on one of those stretchy towelling suits her own lads used to wear. He felt very hot when she picked him up.

  ‘You don’t need all that bedding when it’s such a warm day,’ she chided, as if Alastair had put the clothes on himself. ‘And I think we’ll get this outfit off you too.’ She undid the snappers and unpeeled the suit away from his clammy limbs, then removed his nappy and rubber pants. He was sweating cobs, poor little lamb.

  She stood, laid the baby on her shoulder, and put her cool hand on his back. ‘When Irish eyes are smiling,’ she crooned, and Alastair stopped crying immediately, peed all down her frock, and fell asleep. She was wondering where to lay him, when Sarah came upstairs.

  ‘I thought you’d murdered him,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve thought of murdering him myself a few times over the last few days.’

  ‘No, he went out like a light,’ Marie whispered back. ‘He was far too hot. Have you got some clean cot sheets? Those are all damp. And I’d take them blankets away if I were you. Just put a few towels and a nappy under him in case he pees again and a single sheet on top should be enough in this weather. Next time you nurse him, do it standing up. Me own mammy told me that and it seems to work. And press your hand against his flesh. He’ll feel closer to you than through his clothes.’

  ‘You’re a miracle worker.’ Sarah was looking through drawers. All the furniture was that nice yellow pine stuff. The walls were painted pale blue and the curtains were white cotton with a broderie anglaise frill. ‘I can’t remember where his bedding is.’

  ‘There’s no hurry, girl. Don’t get yourself in a state,’ Marie said calmly, when she herself had been busy biting her nails to the quick less than half an hour before. There was nothing like other people’s problems to take your mind off your own, or so her dear, darling mammy was fond of saying.

  Victoria had invited her friend Carrie to lunch. They had met at school and were still close. Carrie had married at twenty-two and divorced four years later. There were no children. John had been ‘playing around’, and she’d hated men ever since, which was a pity, Victoria thought, because Carrie, with her little snub nose, pouting pink lips, and baby-blonde hair, oozed sex appeal and could have married half a dozen men instead of John.

  ‘I sometimes wish I were a lesbian,’ she said over the curried chicken and rice that had come out of a packet and been heated up in the microwave. ‘Trouble is, I don’t fancy women, not sexually.’

  ‘That is a bit of a drawback,’ Victoria admitted.

  ‘Women are so much more trustworthy and dependable.’

  ‘A bet a lot of men don’t think like that, the ones whose wives have been unfaithful.’

  ‘They probably deserved it.’ Carrie sniffed disdainfully. ‘Hey, this wine’s the gear. What sort is it?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. I just picked the cheapest.’ Victoria looked just a touch shamefaced. ‘I keep forgetting I’ve got money. Perhaps I should have bought champagne. This is the last Sunday lunch we’ll have together in a long time.’

  ‘Miser,’ Carrie said affectionately. She gave her friend an appraising look. ‘You’re remarkably unbitter, considering what that Philip chap did to you.’

  ‘Is there such a word as unbitter?’

  Carrie wrinkled her cute nose. ‘What does it matter as long as you understand what I mean?’

  ‘It matters if you’re a teacher. I hope you’re not teaching the children words that don’t exist. Anyroad, as regards Philip, he didn’t do anything except forget to mention he had a wife who was expecting his child. If the wife had found out about us, she’d have been hurt far more than I was.’ Victoria somehow doubted this. Her heart felt as broken now – well, almost – as it had done three months ago when she’d seen Philip in Marks & Spencer linking arms with a very pregnant young woman. They were looking at baby clothes.

  ‘Huh!’ Carrie said scathingly. ‘I just hope that’s not the reason you’re going to America, as a way of getting over the louse.’

  Victoria thought that might well be the case, but wasn’t prepared to admit it. And, anyroad, just because Philip had turned out to be such a louse, it didn’t mean all men were. Gareth Moran, for instance, she’d trust with her life. They’d got on like a house on fire and she could have talked to him all day. Trouble was, he was already married and had made no secret of the fact.

  ‘A woman in one of the new houses is holding a barby on Saturday,’ she told Carrie. ‘I can bring a friend – would you like to come?’

  Carrie’s face went bright red. ‘Sorry, Vic, I can’t.’

  ‘Why not? Since you got rid of John, you’ve never had anywhere to go on Saturday nights.’

  ‘I’ve met this chap,’ Carrie muttered, her face turning redder. ‘He’s taking me out to dinner.’

  Victoria shrieked with laughter. ‘You hypocrite, Carrie Clarkson. All that guff about hating men. You didn’t mean a word of it.’

  ‘Yes, I did. This one’s bound to turn out to be a louse just like the rest.’

  Earlier, Kathleen had gone next door to introduce herself to the people in Clematis Cottage. ‘They’ll think we’re terribly unsociable,’ she said to Steve before she went. ‘Ever since we moved in, we’ve behaved as if the rest of the world didn’t exist. It’s about time we remembered there are other people on the planet or it’ll come as a shock when we start work.’

  She was starting at the hospital on 1 August and, tomorrow, Steve was going for a job interview, only as a security guard – they wouldn’t see much of each other when he was on nights – but it would do until he found something more convenient. She knew how anxious he was to contribute towards their living expenses.

  ‘Shall I introduce myself as Kathleen Quinn or Kathleen Cartwright?’ she asked. ‘Shall I say you’re my husband or my partner?’

  ‘Husband,’ he said quickly, as she’d guessed he would. He was terribly old-fashioned. He probably still hadn’t come to terms with the fact that people lived together quite openly these days.

  ‘I love you,’ she said, kissing his nose. ‘Don’t touch me,’ she yelped and dodged out of his way when he made a grab for her. If they made love again, she’d never get out of the house.

  Kathleen still had her hand on the knocker of Clematis Cottage when the door opened, so suddenly, that she was taken by surprise. A tall, extremely fit-looking, white-haired man smiled at her.

  ‘I’m just fixing a bell,’ he explained. ‘I was right behind the door. It plays The Minute Waltz by Chopin. Me wife picked it out.’

  ‘It’s one of my favourites,’ Kathleen said.

  ‘Who’s there?’ a sweet voice called. ‘Whoever it is, come in. Ernie’s sulking. He wanted The Red Flag, but I talked him out of it.’

  ‘You bullied me out of it, Anna,’ Ernie said. ‘And I’m not sulking. I’m doing as I’m told like I always do. Go on in, luv. Anna’s in the parlour.’

  The geography was exactly the same as their own bungalow: the living room and main bedroom at the front, kitchen and second bedroom to the rear with a small bathroom and toilet squeezed between. She went into the room that Steve – and the white-haired man – referred to as ‘the parlour’. It was hard to believe that people had only recently moved in. The furniture looked as if it had been there for years: a china cabinet full of dishes and ornaments, a sideboard, statues on the mantelpiece, Impressionist prints on the walls. Carpet with an intense whirly design had been laid on the wood-laminated floor. A petite, silver-haired woman was sitting in a straight-back, padded chair, her fee
t on a footstool. She wore a yellow cotton sweatshirt and white trousers. Oversized gypsy earrings dangled from her tiny ears. She seemed delighted to have a visitor.

  ‘I’m Kathleen Cartwright from next door.’ She extended her hand and the woman seized it, although her grip was surprisingly limp. Kathleen knew immediately she had something wrong with her. ‘How do you do?’

  ‘I’m very well, dear. I’m Anna Burrows and my sourpuss of a husband is called Ernie.’

  ‘He seemed very charming to me.’

  Anna’s blue eyes danced with mischief. ‘He’s just putting it on. He’s a monster when there’s no one else around to protect me.’

  ‘I’m sure that isn’t true,’ Kathleen protested.

  ‘Of course it isn’t true. He’s an old darling. I adore him, but I didn’t think The Red Flag was right for a doorbell. I don’t want all and sundry knowing our politics.’

  ‘You should be proud of your beliefs,’ Ernie shouted from the hall.

  ‘Now you’re eavesdropping, Ernie. Make Kathleen and I some tea, there’s a dear. Or would you prefer coffee, Kathleen? And we’ve got sherry: medium, I think it is.’

  ‘Tea would be fine, thanks.’ She must be ill. She wasn’t the sort of woman who would ask her husband to do things if she was able to do them herself.

  ‘You’re not from Liverpool, are you, dear? I can detect a trace of an accent, but not from round here. I’d say Yorkshire. Am I right?’

  Kathleen gasped. ‘You’re quite remarkable. I didn’t think I had any sort of accent, but I was born in Yorkshire and lived there all my life, until now, that is.’

  ‘I’m good at accents.’ She looked very pleased with herself. ‘I was on the stage when I was young. I even made a film once,’ she said proudly, ‘but I’ve never met anyone who’s seen it.’

  ‘What was it called?’ Kathleen had belonged to a film society in Huddersfield where obscure films were sometimes shown.

  ‘The Fatal Hour, but it’s not the one with Boris Karloff. Mine was made in Hungary before the war. I was only eighteen. I’m not sure if it was ever released. Ernie’s tried to track it down, but no luck, I’m afraid.’